Single Minded: “A Different World”

bucky_inside.jpg

David Cantwell writes:

You’ve probably heard this one: Country music is nostalgic for times that never were.

That cliche’s been wrong more often than not, but that isn’t to say it’s always wrong. Country does look back and, what’s more, it often mourns the passings away that inevitably accompany the passing of time. That’s perfectly understandable if what’s being mourned is, say, dead loved ones or classic sounds or mom and pop groceries. Or, as Bucky Covington sings on his current top ten country single “A Different World,” a time when kids played outside rather than hunkered down with video games, drank from the hose instead of from bottles of water, or even rode bikes with no helmets.  All that and yet, as Covington sings, “Still, here we are…We turned out alright.”

I like the sound of this single–its spare arrangement and its slow shuffle, its Alan Jackson-ish twang and the way this former American Idol contestant undersings. But what I can’t get past is the way Covington’s song lumps what we might reasonably look back upon with fondness, even with regret at what’s been lost, together with a series of things we’re well rid of.

The most obvious example of this is the way Covington pairs up these two elements of the good old days as, apparently, morally equivalent losses: “We got Daddy’s belt when we misbehaved, had three TV channels you got up to change.” I reject the former, philosophically and personally, as something I should remember fondly, let alone rue that it’s a state of affairs not quite as prevalent as it once was. And, let’s not forget that “We got the back of Dad’s hand when we misbehaved” or “We got punched,” or “We were thrown against the wall” is often truer to the case.

We may indeed be overprotective of children today, but is there anyone who, with a moment’s reflection, can honestly claim that most of the modest changes in parenting today haven’t been improvements? Covington sings of an era where “We were born to mothers who smoked and drank; our cribs were covered with lead-based paint. No childproof containers, no seat belts in cars; rode bikes without helmets, but still here we are.”

Of course, the point is that some of us aren’t still here, and precisely for the lack of such precautions.

(Proposed additional lyric:

“Mom felt trapped, Dad hardly said a word.

Our part of town’s all we knew of the world.

Oh life sure was sweet and simple

Before this “handicap accessible.”)

Covington does sing this line: “School always started the same everyday–The Pledge of Allegiance, then someone would pray.” I wonder…outside of a parochial school, in which schools exactly did these prayers occur? Covington, for instance, went to school in the 1980s and early 90s, up to thirty years after school prayer, even in his North Carolina home, had gone the way of segregated buses. 

See, sometimes country music really is nostalgic for a time that never was.  

Bucky Covington “A Different World” from Bucky Covington (Lyrics Street, 2007)

This entry was posted on Friday, August 10th, 2007 at 5:37 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

29 Responses to “Single Minded: “A Different World””

  1. Richard Brandt Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 5:46 pm

    I was going to public schools in Florida and Alabama in the late 1960s and early 70s, and Bible readings were still very much the order of the day. I’m not sure when, if ever, they actually disappeared.

  2. Jerry Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 9:29 pm

    …… and school prayer DID occur in 80s-90s North Carolina public schools - certainly in rural parts of the state and where there were no complaints. It may have been a school-by-school thing rather than a system decision, but it did (and may still) happen.

    Jerry

  3. David Cantwell Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 9:51 pm

    When I said country music was nostalgic, here, for a time that never was, I meant in particular that Covington, and fans of his age, were being nostalgic for a time they never experienced. But it would look like I’m wrong, per your note Jerry.

    Still…something hits me as dishonest there….

    Covington wouldn’t have even gone off to kindergarten before 1983. Let’s say school prayer was still pretty common in rural North Carolina (Covington’s from right along the South Carolina border), or even the entirety of the rural south, through the 80s.

    That still can’t account for the experience of the country audience in the main, which of course lived overwhelmingly in suburban districts, likely never experienced daily morning prayer in public schools, yet are included in the song’s “we.”

  4. Bunny Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 11:02 pm

    Glad you like the song but country music is not necessarily autobiographical. Johnny Cash was never in Folsom Prison, never shot a man just to see him die although I do believe he was thrown in jail overnight a couple of times for misdemeanors. Carrie Underwood did not spend years with alcoholic husband and I am pretty sure she never took a baseball bat to her ex boyfriends car. The song is a great song and my kids born in 77,79 and 83 never wore helmets while riding bikes. The pledge of allegiance was said in elementary school for all three kids but I do believe prayers ended before the youngest got to high school. And….for anyone and everyone born in small town America, not suburbia, we love our country music and almost every word in this song rings true for my children. I drank and smoked and their cribs were covered in lead based paint. Glad you enjoy the song but dont take the lyircs verbatim if you are from suburbia. You guys were always 10 years ahead of us anyway.

  5. sherry Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 11:37 pm

    I am from Richmond county (Rockingham), home of Bucky. We both attended school at the same time, he scotland and I richmond counties and prayer was in our school’s at this time. Yes these are rural areas. I dont beleive country music targets the poor or rich areas of any state. I don’t beleive anyone said anything to Travis Tritt when he wrote “here’s a quarter call someone who cares”. When at this time most phone booths were 35 to 50 cents a call “in the suburban areas.

    “We” in this song may not mean everyone. Though this song is a top 10 single so there are a lot of “we’s” out there who like it.

    Sherry

  6. Barry Says:
    August 11th, 2007 at 12:07 am

    There’s always the issue with this sort of release whether Mr. Covington IS nostalgic or the things he (or someody) lists–or whether it seems good for the current market to seem to be.
    There’s an awful ot of semi-lane signifying going on these days, songs constructed from a You Do’;t Have to Do it Yourself handy country-ish lyric machine.

    Obviously there has always been some of that. (I just got fnished today lisening to a bunch of 1934-36 records by jimmie Rodgers’ cousin jesse Rodgers , sold in an attempt to fill in for the late jimmie–and man, were THOSE song-kit pastiches.

    Which is a long way around to say: Isn’t interetseing, to use a neutral word, that there’s a perecived market-and apparebt responde–to a song nostalgic for the good olf days of getting whooped by a “strong” male.

    Ick. Unless you happen to like that sort of thing.

    Barry

  7. Anne Says:
    August 11th, 2007 at 12:10 am

    Well, everyone may not have experienced all of the things in the song, but everyone can relate to some of them.
    And, I don’t see the relevance to whether Bucky actually experienced school prayer or any/all the other things. He’s just singing the song!

    While, some Country singers may sing autobigraphical tunes, most are just singing a good story that audience can either relate to or be entertained from.
    Re: The Night’s The Lights Went Out In georgia, (they hung an innocent man) Don’t believe that female singer actually did the killing.

    Beer for My Horses, Whiskey for My Men - not even sure what that means, but it’s catchy. Did those singers actually ride into town and say that?

    How about Tim McGraw’s, Last Dollar song? Now, he’s nowhere near his last dollar, but he sang that very convincingly!

    So, how ’bout cutting Bucky some slack. We’ll stick with your first statement about how you like Bucky’s sound.

  8. Cathy Anne Says:
    August 11th, 2007 at 12:49 am

    The things Bucky Covington sings about did actually occur where and when he grew up. This country did not all grow the same all over. Prayer still occured in schools definitely in the bible belt. I believe the only thing he did not experience was all the stores being closed on Sundays.. but I did.

    Don’t forget, Bucky did not write this song, but he sure did experience it and he delivers it well. The other songs on his CD are amazing and I think we can all relate to many of them.

  9. Jackie Says:
    August 11th, 2007 at 4:39 am

    “A Different World” is a GREAT song and Bucky Covington does an excellent job of delivering it! No, he didn’t experience everything he sings about in the song but he did experience some of the things. But it doesn’t matter if he did or didn’t! What does matter is how well Bucky sings it AND that it is in the TOP 5 ON THE COUNTRY CHART! WOOOHOOO! Hopefully it will keep moving up and become #1 where it should be! Way to go Bucky!

  10. Kgator Says:
    August 11th, 2007 at 6:55 am

    Stop!!!!! Why is this an issue? This is a song! So what if Bucky Covington is too young to have experienced any of these things. I am sure that he did but who cares if he didn’t? Maybe the song writer wrote this from his own childhood memories. The world is so lucky to of had this song discovered by Mark Miller and picked to be recorded by Bucky. Please just enjoy this wonderful artist and read the other posts, they are all true.

  11. Barbara Says:
    August 11th, 2007 at 8:11 am

    Some store are still closed on Sundays:
    “Chick-fil-A (IPA pronunciation: /tʃɪkfɪ’leɪ/) is a fast-food restaurant chain headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, that specializes in chicken entrees. It is the second-biggest chicken-based fast-food chain in the United States.[1] The chain is associated with the southern United States, but it has in recent years been expanding into the southwest and the midwest. As of July 2006, the chain has over 1,300 locations in 37 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. It is distinct among fast-food chains as it closes its stores on Sunday, a rarity in the industry.”

  12. David Cantwell Says:
    August 11th, 2007 at 2:36 pm

    This is great, all the response this post has recieved, and from people who don’t normally stop by here. Thanks to all.

    I want to emphasize this point: The issue to me isn’t anything so simple as how well Covington’s biography matches up to the lyrics. In fact, I don’t care about that at all, except to the extent that Covington’s experience is representative of the country audience today generally. And as I say, that’s likely not the case with the majority of folks who’ve sent the song into the top ten.

    At any rate, I take some heart in noticing that most of the concerns I raised–in seven of the posts nine graphs–have so far stood without comment.

    Finally, there is of course an important difference between a store like Chick-fil-A which closes on Sundays out of religious conviction and personal choice and the old blue laws that the song actually refers to, which were mandated by law.

  13. David Cantwell Says:
    August 11th, 2007 at 3:24 pm

    Also…as usual, Barry is right on target. It IS interesting that much of the country audience would pine for the good old days of blue laws, smoking moms, school prayer, and dads who hit their kids.

    Interesting but not surprising. As I say, country music has always been about, in part, mourning the passage of seemingly simpler times–when there were rules that were enforced, by law or by custom, when you knew what to do, and when that security mattered more than whether or not those rules were always fair or moral or even helpful.

    This, as opposed to now when everything is in flux, is moving so fast, and when we all have more freedom but also, in trade, are responsble for figuring out the world and its meanings on our own, day by day by day.

  14. Ed Ward Says:
    August 13th, 2007 at 11:48 am

    And what I find intresting about this song is that it’s almost verbatim a piece of pass-along spam which circulated among the 50-plus crowd about three or four years ago and inevitably crept into the box with a header like “The Good Old Days Weren’t So Bad!!” or something similar.

    Now, if I could just get a handle on some of these other pieces of cyber-folklore people insist on sending me and write a decent tune…

  15. David Cantwell Says:
    August 13th, 2007 at 11:57 am

    Good one, Ed! I’d forgotten about that but I think you’re exactly right…

  16. Barry Says:
    August 13th, 2007 at 5:13 pm

    Now that’s funny. t would be great to pin that down.

    Talk about a handy (readymade even!) countryish lyric machine…

  17. steve Says:
    August 14th, 2007 at 1:09 am

    Damn it, Ed! I realized that this over the weekend, but never got around to writing about it.
    Of course, this isn’t the first e-mail chain letter to be made into a country song. There’s that one where a guy helps a woman change her flat tire and refuses any money, and tells her to pay it forward or something. The woman ends up leaving a big tip for her waitress, whom she’s overheard talking about her financial woes. The woman goes home to her sleeping husband, and guess who it is? That friendly lug who changed the woman’s tire. Wow!
    Favorite chain of late is the one saying that Bob Keeshan (Captain Kangaroo) was a war hero at Iwo Jima, and that Mr. Rogers was a navy SEAL, with 25 registered kills. See, he wears the long sleeve sweaters because he’s got tattoos up and down his arm.

    David, I expected to disagree with you this time, but you’re right, the record is an understated slice of ersatz Alan Jackson. That’s a fine pie to be slicing on.

  18. Ed Says:
    August 16th, 2007 at 6:26 pm

    I just wish Bucky would get a decent haircut, like they had in the good old days. Jesus, he looks like he is appearing in Teen Beat on this album cover.

  19. David Cantwell Says:
    August 16th, 2007 at 7:42 pm

    I thought he looked like Jesus!

  20. mjs4x6 Says:
    August 21st, 2007 at 12:51 pm

    All of this fuss over a guy who can’t sing his way out of a wet paper bag.

  21. Ricky David Tripp Says:
    August 22nd, 2007 at 5:08 pm

    David Cantwell doesn’t quite get it. There’s a subtext going on here that makes me wonder how old HE is. Country music is nostalgic for a time that never was? Where did he live? And when?

    The lyrics, while Bucky is definitely too young to sing most of them, reverberated immediately with me. The images that were called up have less to do with “mothers who smoked,” in that no one will argue that there was anything good or healthy about prenatal smoking.

    What David didn’t get, I will do my best to explain…..

    Mothers who smoked and drank…..cribs covered in lead based paint…..child proof lids, seat belts in cars…..bikes with no helmets…..three TV networks, no video games or satellites…..the Pledge of Allegiance and school prayer, winners and losers with no whining.

    There is an admitted mix of good and bad here. But without getting into the health issues, safety issues, political correctness issues or tech issues, what is being missed here is a WORLD WITHOUT ISSUES. What I felt myself missing as I heard this song for the first time was a world with innocence and ignorance of dangers. It was slower. It was easier. Even if it wasn’t safer or politically correct, you had time to smell the flowers and you felt a lot more free. You knew a cigarette could eventually hurt you, but you got to CHOOSE.

    Abortion was a disgrace. And despite David’s concern over kids thrown into walls — something that will ALWAYS HAPPEN, UNLESS WE OUTLAW PARENTHOOD — most of us got a judicially issued spanking, knew we deserved it, and felt like better people for having gotten it.

    This song appeals to people old enough to remember a time, not when we engaged in practices that were risky or politically unviable, but when we didn’t know any better, David might argue that we’re safer now that parents know not to smoke around pregnant people, or to smoke themselves, that multinationals are more comfortable in classrooms where prayer is prohibited (along with the one or two atheists present), or that digital television’s 250 channels and iPhones are a wonderful thing.

    I would have to respectfully disagree. I don’t regret a single moment I spent “unsafe” at the top of a tree that I climbed. I don’t regret a single open prayer or Bible verse read in my grade school classrooms. Television had a lot more impact, and demanded more quality, with only three channels to choose from. I wouldn’t care if Animal Planet or Spike TV vanished tomorrow.

    That “different world” Bucky sings of seemed to have a lot more possibilities and a wider range of freedom. We weren’t wagged back then by every special interest, and civil rights weren’t defined by whether or not you sucked penises (there, I said it) under the guise of an “alternate life style.” If you did that, you hid it, and we’re the worse for it being out in the open. Most of us belong to religions that teach that it’s a sin, and we’re not too keen on the idea of liberals redefining Bible scriptures as “hate crimes.”

    It’s not enough that people can do things openly that they used to hide. They want them LEGALLY ENDORSED, and anyone who objects to be held guilty of a crime, of denying them their “civil rights.” They want the law bent in such a way that it forces the rest of us to shut up and redefine right and wrong.

    If any of you saw the Brady Bunch movies, especially the first one, you noticed a sneaky subtext. On one side of the fence, it was Astroturf and blue skies. On the other side, it was punks hocking up loogies with pins through their cheeks while grunge songs screamed obscenities through the radio.

    You started out in those movies ridiculing the Bradys, but by the time the end rolled around…..you found yourself wishing it could be that way again.

    It was a world with fewer lawyers, and most of them were subdued. Like Bucky sang, it was a different world — and it was one I loved better.

  22. Wendy Says:
    August 23rd, 2007 at 2:33 pm

    Ricky, it seems you have some pent up anger. Try talking about how you REALLY feel. Seems you need to take a breather and chill. Until you’ve walked a mile in someone’s shoes, you really shouldn’t criticize them. Hope your life gets better…we all need a little more cigarette smoke, alcohol, lead based paint and “penis sucking”. I wish you all the above.

  23. David Cantwell Says:
    August 23rd, 2007 at 4:28 pm

    Ricky: Note that in the piece, I argue that the nostalgic for a time that never was criticism is usually wrong when directed at country music. The nostalgia that Covington, who came of age during the Reagan-Bush-Clinton years, is not for a time that never was but for a time he didn’t live through.

    I do like what you say about simpler times. I don’t think any period is simpler than any other–different, to be sure, with different stresses, but not simpler. However, people do deal with changes and new stresses by longing for the old ones which at least had the benefit of familiarity. As for the good old days being a time where we had more freedom…that really seems counter intuitive to me–those pre civil rights, pre gay rights times you point to were ones where people had far less freedom than they do today. Your obsession regarding those who suck penises, as you put it, seems telling in this regard: Gay men and women were only “the worse for it being out in the open” because out in the open they risked being ostracized or getting the shit kicked out of them. They still do, I’m afraid.

  24. Scott Savage Says:
    August 23rd, 2007 at 6:13 pm

    I agree with with Ricky said. And he said it really well.

    I’m not condoning the drinking, smoking, beating, etc — but it does happen and amazingly some great kids still come out of less than perfect families.

    I didn’t personally get the belt, but my Dad would have spanked us if we deserved it … and gained a heathly respect for parental authority. I NEVER questioned my Dad’s authority and he always had my repect and my 3 brothers as well.

    Most of the very successful people I know had a strong father in their lives, whether he used a belt or a spanking or just strong words or authority.

    I think what I love most about this song was that many of us really did do most of these things … and turned out just fine and you must admit that many kids these days do NOT respect their parents, their teachers, their elders (grandparents) like they should … and thats why most of us preferred our older, simplier world we grew up in.

    A world that was based more on reality than false perceptions created by today’s mass media and the internet. It was a simple world.

    With all the media coverage today, we forget what the real dangers in our lives really are. We hear constantly about “bear attacks” and “mountain lion attacks” …. and think these are really seriously things to worry about on a daily basis, when its really still “car accidents” that kill, but are under-reported … vs. the more sensational “bear attack”, which is super rare and we shouldn’t keep our kids inside because of a dateline story …. you get my drift.

    I do think Bucky might not have experienced all this stuff — but he’s just singing a song somebody else wrote … and doing it very well.

    His deliverly on this song is great. I think it could go to #1 because people like me (age 39) can REALLY relate to it.

  25. Ricky David Tripp Says:
    August 23rd, 2007 at 8:02 pm

    No anger here, Wendy, but I detected some liberal offense in your remarks. I don’t need to take any breathers or chill. I’m just fine. I’ve made peace with a high tech world where liberals celebrate socialism over the America I grew up with where, like the song sings, we said the Pledge and read a Bible verse in grade school. In today’s world, you’d be slapped with a lawsuit and told to stop. There is even an idiot out there who is trying to get “under God” removed from the Pledge, something the late Red Skelton spoke to before he died, never realizing that it would one day come true. I will criticize anyone that I think is wrong — like now — and I will say why. I don’t need to walk in their shoes if they’re filled with mud, and I can see it from a safe distance. As for your cute little remarks wishing me “more cigarette smoke, alcohol, lead based paint and penis sucking,” I can only say that I wish the same for you. Have a nice day.

  26. Ricky David Tripp Says:
    August 23rd, 2007 at 9:09 pm

    To David –

    Thank you for your more measured response than the acidic “Wendy.” I can appreciate what you’re saying as it relates to the concept that everyone wants to look back on older times and think of them as simpler. But in this case, it is actually true.

    Don’t get me wrong — there was nothing simple about Vietnam, the era that I grew up in. Reality for those days was also coming home and watching Walter Cronkite provide the body count for the day. For those families with a body in the count, nothing was simple. I agree totally with you that Bucky’s age and his inability to have lived those lyrics creates a creative credibility issue….but by pointing it out, you bring up an entirely new line of thought, one that no one could have imagined this American Idol wannabee generating.

    This young man recorded the song because the age-biased bastards in Nashville wouldn’t let the writer himself record it — I can almost guarantee you that, without even knowing who the writer is. The writer was undoubtedly old enough to write it, but Nashville closes the door on any male singer over 29 unless he is the member of a group.

    That having been said, what you and other commenters need to be asking about the mini-controversy around this song is: What DID stimulate the writer to write the song? From what emotion or perception did he source it?

    One guess of mine is that he among those who are weary of the political climate today that has to legislate, regulate, adjudicate and eradicate all things familiar, comforting and pleasurable. Liberals want to tax fattening food because it contributes to obesity. They want to tax cigars $10 apiece, all in the name of health care that ironically depends on the sale of products that no one in government wants anyone to use anymore!

    If a child slides down a slide the wrong way in a playground, and gets hurt, instead of saying, “Oh, goodness, he had an accident, but he’ll be okay,” lawyers line up to sue whoever owns the playground and, before you know it, the slide (and the fun that goes with sliding down it) is gone.

    Everyone loves DVDs and Blu-Rays and home theatre sound systems with their big screen LCD high definition televisions. But nothing about them can ever replace the feeling of going to a drive-in movie theatre, eating popcorn and fighting mosquitos on a summer night. Technology — and climbing property taxes — took all of that away from us, along with distributors who made single screens unprofitable for exhibitors.

    Wendy made a big brohaha about the attention-grabbing reference to “penis sucking,” but at the base of it all, I come from a train of thought that says “being gay” is defined by what you do, not by what you are. No one “is” gay, but rather, is someone who performs certain acts. I don’t hate anyone. A tiny few of my past and present friends identify themselves as “gay,” and I look on it much in the same way as wishing that they didn’t smoke. Smoking is an unnatural act — breathing smoke always is — just as being drawn to perform sexual acts with someone of your own gender.

    But do I hate the gay people I know? No more than the smokers. It’s something, in both cases, that they DO and I wish (for their own sakes) that they didn’t do it, whatever “it” is. Do you agree? Do you disagree? You’ll do one or the other, but it won’t change my mind.

    The point of the songwriter is this: That world that he describes wasn’t filled with the angst that Wendy feels, because we didn’t have a politically charged media pounding us daily with issue after issue about the way we live. Is it safer to ride a bike without a helmet? I don’t ride without one today, but I loved the days that I didn’t as a kid. Is it safer to wear seat belts? Sure it is. But many of my happiest childhood memories were had playing in the back seat during a long drive to Missouri without a seat belt in site.

    And like the songwriter says, I turned out alright. Not true of everyone, but it never is. Much of our freedom has been lost in the course of regulation aimed at making us safer. But people still die in car wrecks. This is about those of us that don’t.

    It’s also about a time when we didn’t turn the TV on and hear about the next ten things that are going to make us sick, or what new special interest group wants its “rights” next. Here in Arkansas, famous for the Central High crisis of 1957, we have a black majority school board completely out of control, who just ejected a qualified, dedicated BLACK superintendent who wouldn’t kiss their rings, or put black children above white children. They bought him out for $650,000, crippling the district budget and guaranteeing future lawsuits.

    In turn, they WON a court decision declaring the Little Rock School District to be “unitary” (which means black and white are taught the same), releasing us from federal court monitoring. What did the black majority school board do? They REJECTED the court findings, and voted to MEDIATE with a self-appointed civil rights (black) attorney, John Walker, keeping millions of dollars flooding into his coffers, while jeopardizing a $15 million loan forgiven by the state they are going to rebill to the district.

    Seems that civil rights and even winning court cases didn’t wake some black folks up. They’re too busy being “victims.” LRSD parents are slowly coming around to vote the black majority OFF the school board, and MOST of these parents are BLACK!!

    Sorry, David, but at 52, I’m going to vote for that simpler time that some say never existed. For me, it did. I don’t miss the smoking, but I do miss not being scared of everything, or of worrying about kids playing with Mattel toys made in China that need to be recalled. I miss not being scared of riding a bike without a helmet, which I did all through my childhood, playing in the back seat unbuckled on a long trip, eating ice cream without a diet expert telling me that I was going to have blocked arteries someday. I miss eating oysters on the half shell without worrying about food poisoning.

    I miss those drive-ins, vinyl records with fold-outs, lyrics you could read, and even posters, and dart guns with solid (not foamy) darts. I miss laughing at knocking things off the dining room table with my Agent Zero-M Sonic Blaster before it became the first toy taken off the market by child toy safety laws.

    I miss playing on playgrounds before the lawyers drove the cost of insurance so high that many property owners just skipped out on having them. I miss the days when we didn’t have “gay pride” parades, millions of abortions, and most of all, I miss the days BEFORE rap “music” which, of course, isn’t music at all but just violent poetry set to pathetic instrumentation, “performed’ by known thugs, murderers, and “gangstas” who advocate violence toward women and law officers. No wonder that several times a year, we read of another “rap” star who was capped in a drive-by, or who was charged with murder or drug possession.

    I suspect that the writer of “A Different World” would agree with me, but you are obviously a gentleman and we will agree to disagree. I see your points, but I also see what this writer was trying to say. I wish you as happy a life as I had, and continue to have, whatever your age is.

  27. mjs4x6 Says:
    August 24th, 2007 at 3:35 pm

    There is nothing in this song that wasn’t siad better by Merle Haggard in “Are the Good Times Really Over?”

    Are there actually people out there who think Bucky Covington can sing? You can almost hear the pitch correctors grinding on this recording.

  28. Roy Says:
    August 27th, 2007 at 5:15 am

    Not that I think it matters, but among the many things Ricky is wrong about is the “undoubted” background (and gender) of the songwriter: So Cal native Jennifer Hanson is all of 34 years old and her hubby and co-writer Mark Nesler isn’t much more than that, near as I can tell. She has a new record coming out on Universal South, and for the record, she’s a looker.

  29. B Says:
    February 6th, 2008 at 4:03 pm

    WOW! So many statements and opinions over A SONG! It almost resembles a political debate over bathroom tissue usage!

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